The Outlaw
by SamBlob
Summary: A stranger rides into Kadic. Suspicions are raised, but is he as he appears? Also, a shadow falls over Yumi that threatens to engulf them all...
1. Arrival

**Author's note:**

All claims, disclaimers and acknowledgements for this story will be posted in the Author's Note before Chapter 1. The only other Author's Notes will be at the beginning of each chapter and will direct the reader to these notes at the beginning of Chapter 1.

I will post each chapter after I finish writing the chapter that comes after it. This will apply for all chapters except the last.

**Disclaimers:**

"Code Lyoko" and its characters are the property of Antefilms Ltd.

Adrian Flowerdew is my own creation, but he is also the grandson of Ginger Flowerdew who was created by the late Richmal Crompton, as were William Brown and their friends Henry and Douglas, whose surnames I do not recall. These characters are therefore the property of Ms. Crompton's estate. Adrian Flowerdew refers to these characters in the past tense because, like their creator Ms. Crompton, they are all dead at the time in which this tale is set.

A verse from "The Charge of the Light Brigade" by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, is used in Chapter 2. The emphasis and punctuation of this verse have been altered to interpret the manner of speech of the speaker.

A line from "The Old Familiar Faces" by Charles Lamb is used in Chapter 4.

The following poems are mentioned in the story:

"Crossing The Bar" – Walt Whitman  
"O Captain My Captain" – Alfred, Lord Tennyson  
"Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night" – Dylan Thomas  
"Dulce Et Decorum Est" – Wilfred Owen

**Claims:**

Mr. Maillard and Robert Clydesfirth are my own creations, as is the aforementioned Adrian Flowerdew.

While I am certain there is enough poetry about war and death to warrant the compilation of an anthology titled "Poetry of War and Death", I know of no such anthology and therefore presume the anthology mentioned in Chapter 2 to be a figment of my imagination.

_**This is the end of the Author's Note.**_

* * *

**THE OUTLAW**

**1. Arrival.**

They all heard him approaching before they saw him arrive, his machine wailing like a lawn mower gone berserk and heading toward them at the speed of an express train. By the time the motorcycle reached the gate it had slowed down to a little above the speed at which the students would normally have walked through the gate. Now, however, no one was walking. Everyone was either standing on the side of the path or scurrying to get there. He had created a fearsome impression before anyone had seen him, or had any idea who he was. Thus encouraged, the rider increased his speed to that of a fast run and continued to park a little beyond the delivery door to the cafeteria.

Being more curious than most of the other children, Odd was the first to approach the area where the rider had parked. He watched the rider from a distance as he removed his helmet. The rider's appearance was almost as individual as Odd's own. The leather jacket, fingerless leather gloves and blue jeans may have been _de rigueur _for a bike rider, but the cowboy boots were not. Their being heavily soaped and polished could not hide the fact that they were also heavily worn. The silver buckles that on each boot held a leather strap more or less tautly from ankle to ankle took to polishing remarkably better than the rest of the boots did, and the right ankle strap was very obviously newer than the rest of the boot. The tops of the boots, into which were tucked the legs of his jeans, were decorates with leather fringes, stamped and plated tin figures, and beads.

The individual look below his jeans, however, was minor when compared to his face. The hair atop his head was reasonably short, and the beard below his chin was quite closely cropped. Most of his flaming red hair, however, was on his face in the form of a huge handlebar moustache and almost equally huge sideburns that, all together, formed a continuous expanse of hair from one ear to the other. Despite its considerable mass, this bulk of hair was kept in control almost as rigidly as that which Odd sported on his head. The moustache and sideburns flowed gracefully into each other, making him look rather more military than grizzled.

To Odd, however, this wholly individual look brought forward a concept vague to his mind, a kind of historical figure he had not much thought of, a figure somewhat lost to his generation after almost a century of being a well-recognized visage. Odd spoke his thought aloud: "Wow! A cowboy!"

Ulrich had by this time caught up with his roommate, and had seen what Odd saw. Being better informed than Odd as a result of reading his father's old cowboy comics at his grandfather's house and later of reading books that tried to separate Old West facts from Old West lore, Ulrich saw someone rather different. The meticulously groomed face did not speak of someone living a hard life in open country. Ulrich's suspicion was further raised when the rider opened his jacket and looked at his watch... his railroad watch. Cowboys reckoned time by the day and the mile, and if they wanted to know how much of the day he had left he simply looked up and quickly figured it from how high the sun was in the sky. Railroad watches were for the events of men: the arrival of a train or stagecoach, the opening or closing of a bank, the time a certain individual would usually enter a saloon, the time a certain individual would usually stagger out of a saloon.

Despite the rough clothes, Ulrich did not figure the stranger to be a cowboy. He took him to be something far more dangerous. An outlaw. A gunman. A killer.

"I don't know," Ulrich said to his roommate, "but I've got a bad feeling about this guy…"


	2. Introduction

**All claims, disclaimers and acknowledgements for this story are posted in the Author's Note at the beginning of Chapter 1.  
****

* * *

THE OUTLAW**

**2. Introduction.**

"Good morning, class!" the Principal said. "I am here to introduce you to your new language teacher, Mr. Adrian Flowerdew. Mr. Flowerdew replaces Mr. Maillard who, as you remember, is no longer with us…"

"No longer with us!" thought Jeremy. "No longer with us! Why doesn't he say it? Mr. Maillard is dead. Alive and well one minute, dead the next. The coroners are baffled, as always. They can't understand why every vital organ failed at once. But we understand. We know. He died just like the others we failed to save. The return to the past can't bring back what's not there to be brought back."

Jeremy would have continued to reflect on how Mr. Maillard _really_ died, how Yumi tried to save him and nearly got herself killed in the process, how guilty Yumi felt that she couldn't save him, and how guilty he felt for thinking that, if one of them had to go, he was thankful it was Maillard and not Yumi. Mercifully, however his thoughts were cut short by his realization that Odd was kicking his chair.

"It's him!" Odd hissed. "The cowboy!"

He looked less like a cowboy than he did when Odd and Ulrich saw him with his motorcycle. He wore a navy blue suit with the jacket open to reveal a dark purple shirt with white and lime-green pinstripes and a white tie. His cowboy boots had been replaced with black loafers with spats. It would not have been difficult to imagine him with a fedora, a toothpick hanging from his mouth, and a tommy-gun, just as earlier he looked like he could have used a Stetson and a six-gun to complete his look. However, the Prohibition-era gangster image was rejected immediately whenever they looked at those huge military whiskers, which spoke more of horse and sabre than of running board and tommy-gun.

He still had the railroad watch; while the watch itself was hidden from view, the telltale chain appeared from the third buttonhole on his shirt and went downward and toward his right side until it disappeared into a fob pocket just above his normal right pants pocket. It fit his attire much better now than it did before. His current appearance cemented Ulrich's vague misgivings into a deep distrust. He was certain now that this Mr. Flowerdew was dangerous, and to be avoided at all cost.

Ignorant of the apprehension his appearance was causing, or perhaps merely indifferent to it, Mr. Flowerdew walked between the rows of desks and spoke to the class: "I am sure most of you believe language class to be a long, boring list of rules that you are supposed to remember when speaking or writing so that you can get a good grade. It is rather more than that. It is to give you an appreciation of language, which is no less than a comprehensive communication system. The purpose of language is for individuals to communicate precisely with each other. The reason for all the boring rules is to enhance the precision of language. Full and clear understanding of the rules enables one to use the rules to communicate ideas and descriptions, and also to use them, or creatively to break them, in order to express feelings or emotions. However, in order to know how to break them effectively, one should know what they are and why they exist."

"Wow!" Odd said to his colleagues, "He must be good at language; he sure uses a lot of it!"

"The communication of emotions," continued the object of Odd's ridicule, "is perhaps the most difficult burden the function of language has to bear. It is not that difficult in face-to-face conversation, where facial expression and vocal inflection play a greater part in communicating emotion, but the written word does not have these advantages. It is left to the writer's vocabulary and to his knowledge of how to use and manipulate the rules of language to speak to the reader at the deepest level. It should not be surprising, therefore, that the best examples of emotional writing are usually found in poetry, where the rules of writing differ a little to allow for greater means of expression."

This was too much for Odd, who blurted out, "Roses are red, violets are blue, septic tanks stink, and how do you do!" for all to hear.

Ulrich, who normally thought such doggerel to be funny, watched apprehensively and waited for the other shoe to drop.

Mr. Flowerdew glared furiously at Odd, and then a sneer flashed across his face too quickly to be noticed. Glaring once again, he snarled: "I suppose you are one of those boys who believe that poetry is some soppy stuff of flowers and silly nonsense created by the lovesick for the lovesick!" His face then collapsed immediately into a dejected frown and he turned and walked toward his desk. "I suppose you're right," he moped. "What can I say to dispel that perception? Nothing really, except…

"CANNON to the right of them," he boomed as he whipped around to face Odd, who yelped at the combined assault of the explosive fury of Mr. Flowerdew's voice, the swiftness and violence of his turn, and the dark, thunderous look on his gnarled face. "CANNON to the left of them," he continued without pause. "CANNON in front of them volleyed and thundered; Stormed at with shot and shell, Boldly they rode and well, Into the jaws of DEATH, into the mouth OF **HELL**…" he paused, his eyes bulging, the purple veins straining in his neck, his face rigid in a look of demonic fury, and then, hissing through his teeth, he continued in a low but ominous voice: "…rode the six hundred."

He turned again toward his desk and said in a voice just loud enough to audible by everyone, "Tell Tennyson that poetry is soppy girl stuff."

There was silence for a minute and a half, at which point Mr. Flowerdew gave them an assignment from the text to be completed within the remainder of the class.

As the bell rang and the children started to get up, Mr. Flowerdew shouted from his desk "You there! Purple and pink! What's your name?"

"Me?" asked Odd.

"Yes, you! The rest of the class is dismissed!"

"Odd, sir," he said, as the rest of the class filed out of the room, Ulrich lagging behind the others.

"An appropriate enough name, I would imagine. Come here, boy!"

"Yes, sir," Odd said, and he approached the desk with anguish. Ulrich waited by the door.

"I am not giving you this," the teacher said as he pulled a book from his bag. "I am merely lending it to you until the end of the year. You will probably enjoy it and might actually learn something from it." He handed the book to Odd. "I want it returned in good condition, mind!" he admonished.

Odd looked at the cover. It had no picture or pattern on it, just a green background with white lettering that read "Poetry of War and Death / Compiled by Robert Clydesfirth"

"You may go now," Mr. Flowerdew said.

"Thank you, sir," Odd said as he left.


	3. Assessment

**All claims, disclaimers and acknowledgements for this story are posted in the Author's Note at the beginning of Chapter 1.

* * *

THE OUTLAW **

**3.Assessment.**

The three of them met Yumi at lunchtime.She was still morose. They all were, really. Mr. Maillard had just been buried the previous week. He was O.K. as teachers went; none of them had particularly liked or disliked him, but it is always hard when someone one is accustomed to dies, and it is much worse when one sees it happen, as Yumi had.

The natural topic of conversation, therefore, was Maillard's replacement.

"He's evil, I tell you!" Ulrich said. "Odd, I wouldn't read that book if I were you! He'll probably use it to brainwash you!"

"Ulrich, do you have any idea how paranoid you sound?" asked Jeremy.

"Hmm… 'The Charge Of The Light Brigade', 'Crossing The Bar', 'O Captain My Captain', 'Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night'… what's this one? 'Dulce Et Decorum Est?' What's that, something in Latin?"

"Please, Odd, don't read any of that around me!" said Yumi. She had read "Dulce Et Decorum Est" before, and now it reminded her too much of how Maillard had died. She wanted to throw up. "I have to leave now!" she said, and she raced toward the bathroom.

They were all watching her run from them when they heard a voice behind them say: "Well, well, it seems as if Yumi has finally become allergic to you all!"

"Well, Sissy," Ulrich replied, "she's not been feeling well lately, and then you came by and your perfume was too much for her."

"It's almost too much for me too!" added Odd. "Fortunately, I've got a strong appetite," he continued as he launched into his dessert.

"Hm!" exclaimed Sissy. "Don't get any of that cake on Mr. Flowerdew's book or he might go nuts on you!"

"Gee, Sissy, I didn't know you cared" replied Odd as he rested his chin on his upturned palm and fluttered his eyelids at her.

Sissy growled, turned on her heels, and walked away.

"One good thing about Sissy," Odd said, "no matter how low you get, she's always good for a laugh!"

"She's right about the book, though," said Ulrich. "Don't let anything touch it!"

"Or else what?" asked Odd. What's he going to do, kill me?"

"Maybe," replied Ulrich, "you never can tell…"

"Ulrich, you're overreacting," Jeremy interjected. "Mr. Flowerdew is a teacher, and maybe a bit of a zealot, but he's not a murderer. Sure he'd be upset. He'd probably punish Odd. He might make him pay for the book. But that's as far as it can go! What's the worst that he can do?"

* * *

During the rest of the week, they found out the worst Mr. Flowerdew could do. At least, they hoped that was the worst. Their classes were filled with his rules and lectures and tangents and drama, and their nights were filled with his homework. He hovered like a seagull over them, waiting for the slightest infraction, the appearance of which would cause him to swoop down and strike. He caught Odd drawing his usual picture of Kiwi peeing against a rock, had the drawing passed around the classroom, and added to the class's homework a one-page critique of the drawing. Odd got a different assignment, though; he was to write two pages about the drawing, which was to include descriptions of his inspiration and his technique. "Be thankful you only got two pages. After all," he said, "a picture is usually worth a thousand words!" 

The steely eye and hovering manner he exhibited in the classroom was equally evident in his marking of their homework, as was his sarcastic wit. Not even Jeremy was immune to his scrutiny; one of his assignments was even visited upon with the indignity of a B-plus. "Had it been worse," Mr. Flowerdew wrote on Jeremy's assignment, "I would have given it a C-double-plus, since that appears to be the language in which it is written."

"Ulrich's right!" Odd said to his two companions over breakfast that Saturday. "He's a monster! We won't have a moment's peace while he's around!"

"Well, he is harsh," replied Jeremy, "but he's not that bad. On the bright side, at least no-one told him about Kiwi when he gave us that extra assignment!"

"I still say he's worse news than he's been so far," said Ulrich. "He's just not right. And I don't mean the homework, and the hard grades, and the sarcasm. There's just something not right about him, that's all."

"I wish Yumi was herself again," replied Jeremy. "She'd show you that you're just being ridiculous."

"Well, I wish Yumi was herself again too," retorted Ulrich a little too harshly. "She'd tell you what I'm telling you, only so you'd understand!"

* * *

With that, they had touched on a subject against which all their tribulations with Mr. Flowerdew paled by comparison. Yumi was decidedly not herself. She hardly ate, and usually could not hold down what little she had eaten. The toilet bowl saw more of her face than the cafeteria did. She barely slept, and toward the end of the week she seemed to be in a perpetual daze. She had stopped training with Ulrich, and had become pale and weak. 

The worst for Jeremy had come the night before his conversation with Ulrich and Odd about Mr. Flowerdew. He had woken up in the middle of the night and couldn't get back to sleep, so he went online and worked on anti-virus program for Aelita. He got stuck (_again!_ he thought disdainfully) so he stopped for a while and was chatting with Aelita.

His cell phone rang. "Who'd be calling me at this hour?" he asked himself.

"I don't know!" replied Aelita. "I hope there's nothing wrong!"

There was something wrong, but there was nothing Jeremy could do but listen. It was Yumi, and she wanted to talk.

"The last time we were on the 'phone at this time of night," Jeremy told Yumi, "you mixed up the 'phone and the alarm clock."

"I can't sleep!" Yumi croaked. "I keep seeing him, seeing his face, hearing him scream! You can't understand how horrible it was!"

He couldn't understand. He knew he couldn't understand. Even though Yumi was describing it to him again, even though he was hearing exactly the same story for the third time, he did not have enough imagination to comprehend how horrible it was. From how it was described, however, Jeremy was, for probably the only time in his life, thankful for his limitations. It was a scene from Hell, and Jeremy thought that if such a place as Hell existed, it would be at least like living through the scene described for every moment throughout all existence.

And yet he did not know which was worse, the horrible scene described by Yumi, or hearing her, who had always been the strongest of the team both in mind and in spirit, fearfully whimpering and sobbing like a scared little girl. He felt as if his heart would collapse. By the time the call ended, he looked as pale and jittery as Yumi had when he saw her last.

Aelita, shocked by Jeremy's appearance when he returned to the computer, exclaimed "Jeremy! What happened?"

"It's Yumi. She's… well, she's a bit down" Jeremy understated. Grossly.

"She's probably devastated. From what you told me, it sounded horrible!"

"It did. It still does."

"Do you think that maybe this has gone on too long?" Aelita asked.

"What do you mean, Aelita?"

"I mean Maillard wasn't the first, and he might not be the last, unless…"

"Unless what?" Jeremy asked, knowing what Aelita was going to say and not wanting to hear it.

"Unless you pull the plug on XANA."

"With you still linked to him by that virus? Not an option!"

"Maybe it should be. Who knows what will happen if you fail against XANA the next time he attacks? He might destroy the school, even the whole city!"

"None of us would even think of it!"

"Come on, Jeremy; Yumi's probably thinking of it right now! And I'm sure it's crossed all of your minds since your teacher's death. Even yours."

"I… I can't… you can't… I just need a little time!" Jeremy exclaimed. "The program's almost finished! A few days, maybe a few weeks, and you'll be here safely with us, free of XANA! Then we can pull the plug. But I won't let anyone destroy you, Aelita!"

"But you would let me destroy others." Aelita replied.

"Why would you destroy anyone?" Jeremy asked.

"I already have, haven't I? If it wasn't for me, your teacher would still be alive."

Silence. Cold, hard silence. Jeremy shivered.

"Jeremy?"

"I have to sleep now, Aelita. I'll talk with you again tomorrow. Well, later today, actually."

"Think about it. Ask the others what they think."

"We'll talk later. Right now I have to sleep." It was not entirely a lie; he really needed to sleep. He knew, though, that he would not sleep. He couldn't sleep after what Yumi had told him and, even if somehow he could, what Aelita told him ensured that he would be staring at the opposing wall until the light through his window would allow him to see it.


End file.
